The Cowboy and the Lady Reviews

Oberon and her uncle, Davenport, are picked up when the nightclub they are attending is raided. Kolker, Oberon's dad, is running for President and wants to keep his madcap daughter out of the papers, so he deposits her on his palatial Florida estate. She can't take the quiet and goes off with Patsy Kelly and Mabel Todd (the house maid and cook) on blind dates with three cowboys from a local rodeo. Oberon is paired with Cooper and tells him that she is a poor working girl who is struggling to support an alcoholic father and four younger sisters. Cooper believes her, and they all go back to the big house for a party which they hold in the kitchen in much the same way the "Downstairs" group in "Upstairs, Downstairs" might have. Cooper falls in love with Oberon and returns the following day to propose marriage, but she is so nervous that a failure to communicate ensues, so Cooper stalks out and gets aboard a ship sailing for the port city of Galveston. Oberon realizes that she does love the galoot, so she joins him, and they are married by Vogeding, captain of the vessel. After a while, Oberon gets mentally saddle sore and wants out of rodeo existence, so Cooper tells her to take a rest back in Florida and then join him later at his Montana spread. The marriage is discovered by Kolker's aides, and they would like to keep it quiet as Kolker is getting closer to the nomination for President. Cooper receives word that Oberon can't go to Montana right now, and he responds by rushing to Florida where he walks in on a huge fete tossed for the prospective president. While the others are in dinner clothes, Cooper is dressed as a cowboy, so the party guests look at him as though he were from another planet. Oberon tries to avoid him, and he eventually gets the picture, turns to the snobs, and makes one of his famous speeches extolling the virtues of Americanism, manliness, and solid citizenry. With a few alterations, the words could have come right from the mouth of MR. DEEDS, GOOD SAM, or JOHN DOE. Cooper turns on his boot heels and exits. No sooner has he left when Kolker's assistant suggests an annulment. Oberon faints and Kolker is stunned. Davenport, ever the avuncular actor, then explains that Kolker's political ambitions are destroying his beloved daughter's opportunity for lifelong happiness. The light having been seen, Kolker withdraws from the political arena, and Oberon and Cooper are able to achieve happiness forever. Despite the excellent cast, there is little of interest in this decidedly unfunny comedy. Nevertheless, it did manage to win an Oscar for Thomas Moulton's sound recording, and was nominated for two other Academy Awards, Best Original Score and Best Song (the title song by Lionel Newman and Arthur Quenzer). Walter Brennan won an Oscar in 1938, but it wasn't for this picture. He got his second statuette as Best Supporting Actor in KENTUCKY after having received his first two years before in COME AND GET IT. He was to win again in 1940 for supporting Gary Cooper again, in THE WESTERNER.